The Common Grounds Podcast
Healthcare sales is a different world — complex systems, long sales cycles, and relationships that make or break everything. After nearly 40 years in the industry, I’m sharing the real strategies, stories, and lessons that actually move the needle. We’ll uncover how community, connection, and genuine trust can accelerate your career faster than any pitch deck. If you’re ready to sell smarter, stand out, and grow your network the right way, you’re in the right place. Welcome to Common Grounds.
The Common Grounds Podcast
Developing Content That Connects with Heather Parady
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**What if the secret to growing an audience isn't more content — it's the *right* content?**
In this episode, I sit down with Instagram creator and content strategist **Heather Parady** for one of the most energizing conversations I've had on this podcast. We dig into what it really takes to generate ideas that land, why some content connects deeply with people while other content falls flat, and how creators can stop spinning their wheels and start showing up with intention.
If you've ever stared at a blank screen wondering what to say — or felt like you're posting into the void — this conversation will change the way you think about your content.
🎧 **Don't miss this one.**
Welcome to the Comedy Grounds podcast, exploring how authentic relationships drive business success. Join your host, Ansel Lee, as he has coffee with someone who is mastering the art of connection. So sit back, grab your own cup of coffee, join Ansel and his guests as they explore themes of healthcare, business, and building relationships in the marketplace. And now, here's your host, Ansel Lee.
SPEAKER_01Hey everybody, hey, welcome to another edition of Ansel Lee Live slash uh Common Grounds podcast. And uh so glad to have you today. And I've got I've got dogs barking, I've got uh uh things popping up on my on my screen to remind me of things. So thank you for being here today, and um hey, and so excited about our guest here, and um and uh to have a rock star like this on today is just uh just pretty cool. So of course everything's going wrong uh when as uh we get on here. So um, but before I introduce her, I just want to say just a quick word about our common grounds uh community. And um hey, common grounds communities, but healthcare, um folks in healthcare leadership, folks in health tech, medtech, biotech, we kind of all come together in a private community and uh really connect and help each other collaborate. Maybe open a door for somebody. If you're interested in common grounds community, hey, just send me a send me a note and we'll we'll have a quick chat. But uh but hey, the real the the real deal today is uh here uh here in front of us, Heather Parody. Heather, welcome to uh to the uh to my LinkedIn Live.
SPEAKER_03It's an honor to be here. I've really enjoyed talking to you last time and thank you for thinking of me again.
SPEAKER_01Well, you bet. You bet. And um wow this what a you know about a a a quick year has probably gone by uh since uh since we you know have been on on uh live here. Um and um that's that's amazing to me. It just life goes flies by. Um so hey, uh just introducing uh Heather. Heather Parody is a you know me. I first started following Heather on uh Instagram and uh just love uh the videos, the well done, thoughtful, created videos and and the insights she she uh um she gives and to certain topics. And it's um so from there I just reached out and and uh she's been kind enough to to talk to me. And um so um how hey Heather, how long have you been doing that, by the way?
SPEAKER_03Well, uh kind enough to talk to you. It's an honor to talk to you. I think you're doing some incredible work in the world, and it's a gift to be spend some time with you. So thank you for your kind words. Um how how long have I been creating content online? An an embarrassing amount of time, a very long time. Um goodness. I think I started probably in my early 20s. I'm almost 40, um, just with blogging and trying to build something. I was a photographer at the time going through school, graduate school, to be a mental health therapist, and um kind of got wrapped into this whole online space. I was very curious about it, very interested. I thought it was really cool that you know you could record yourself on a microphone and someone who's never met you before could hear your whole story. And so it really captured me. And I did it very poorly for a very long time. And I would still argue am still doing it very poorly compared to in my mind and my spirit what I see. Um, but I enjoy it. I really, really enjoy it. It's a lot of fun figuring out how to communicate better.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's uh no, you're very well, you know, and that's kind of my kind of my one of my my things that I uh um you know hang my hat on. I I I tell my myself and I tell my my team and I tell my family, you know, anything worth doing well is worth worth doing poorly at first. And so you know, it's just starting to do something. I you know, I think that's one of when I talk to folks, even just posting on LinkedIn, you know, I that's one of their biggest everybody's like, oh, I gotta get it right. I gotta, you know, I gotta do it right. What would you say to that?
SPEAKER_03I think if folks understood how hard it actually is to get attention, they wouldn't worry about themselves so much. You know, you know that's true. You know that's true. When you're when you're really, really trying to push something out there, it is insanely difficult to capture attention and build community community online. And the reason is not because you suck, but because there's so much stuff pulling at our eyeballs and our attention and our focus. Um, and I'm ashamed to say it, it's just the human condition at this point. I've been deep down a rabbit hole with like attention, economy, and what's actually going on with tech and you know, the implications of that from like a human standpoint, it is wildly difficult to capture attention. You have to be either so good or hit it at a certain moment or be so freaking stubborn, which is where I'm betting my hat on, you know, is just being stubborn, that you wouldn't you wouldn't worry so much. So folks who try to perfectly craft something or worry themselves to death about an edit, you can do that and you're not gonna get the eyeballs and the attention you think you're going to get. And that's not to be discouraging. I hope that's very liberating for people because you have the freedom and you have a the gift of being a beginner. And I would still consider myself a beginner, even though I've been doing this for 10, 15 years of putting myself out there online. I I have a 13-year-old, she's not grown. So if I look at my creative work as a teenager, a preteen, you know, I'm still very young. Um, and so all that to say, like people worry about it and then they put themselves out there and then they don't get attention and they think, oh, it's because I suck, I should be doing this, without realizing you can be really, really good. And it just takes a time and uh a grind and consistency to actually be seen. So you have more freedom to mess up than you think you do.
SPEAKER_01I I I I agree a hundred percent. And and you know, and I and and I I just told a story or um hosted a newsletter, I think yesterday, and I talked about um walking into an innovation accelerator uh a couple weeks ago. It was just kind of surreal in that from from person to person I would go to I I got this yeah that hey, I I see you on LinkedIn, or I follow you on LinkedIn. And yeah, I was talking to Conway Regional, the hospital here, and somebody walks up and said, Hey, you're famous. I'm like, and we so we had a big chuckle about that, and and and we got a picture made together, and she sent it to my my son, who she was a friend of my she is a friend of my son's, and Ansel Four. And and and it but the whole night was kind of like that. And I had to go after I you know, I I went down the elevator, and they actually had church Orion building downtown Little Rock, and they actually asked me it was high security that they I don't the guy that rode down the elevator even looked up at me and said, I I follow you on LinkedIn. I'm like it was just and then he started asking me how to you know create content. And I, you know, and I just had to go out and after I it was such a great conversation. He was such a nice young man, and and uh went out and just sat in my my my car after that and went, Wow. You know, it it and you know I don't do I don't really um don't do anything stupid stupendous, but here's one thing I do is I show up and uh you know and I'm and and I'm out there and it may just be the worst, you know, whatever. And but you know, I sh I I just am like like as you say, I just try to I just stick to it the best I can.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. You know I worked at Conway Regional, right? They'll tell you that in my early twenties.
SPEAKER_01You know uh that kind of is in the back of my mind somewhere, but you hear people that yeah, and and um here's here's how one up yeah, I was born at Conway Regional.
SPEAKER_02That's cool.
SPEAKER_01So so um um so you know, I with with all the stuff that you do, and that's a that's great, um, you know, your with your background, you know, I mean you do some you do some really creative, well done, I mean I just love how you put things together, how you pull in video, how you I mean it's really next level kind of stuff. And um how how did you get there? You know, how did you get to, you know, um because you're I mean it's just so well done together.
SPEAKER_03Um Thank you. Um I'm gonna answer the answer this a little bit differently because it's not how did I get there? It's me I'm always trying to figure out how do I get better. And I think the answer to that question, um, this is quoting something love them or hate them. Uh Jay Shetty said in in a podcast recently that one of his meditation teachers taught him that if you want to go three steps forward, you have to go three steps deeper first. And I think about that a lot in the sense of having something to say. You know, um it's really interesting the time that we're living in and thinking about being a creator or being a communicator. And I know a lot of your audience isn't necessarily looking to like create content for content's sake. Maybe there's a business they're starting, maybe there's a cause that they're interested in, you know, maybe they're just trying to build a personal brand so that they have job security from one thing to the next. But it's thinking about how do you position yourself and have an angle, to have a point of view, to have something that you bring to the table. And I don't want this to be intimidating by any means. I want it to be empowering because it's this idea that you actually have something to contribute, that your point of view, that your experiences is something worth hearing and listening to. Because a lot of times creators, I work with a lot of them, you know, they'll have a business and they're wanting to create some kind of platform and in whatever industry that they have, and they look around them and they're like, oh, well, what is this influencer doing or what's trending right now, or what's popular, or what's gonna get me found, versus really digging in deep and saying, what do I have to say? You know, and I'm a very spiritual person, as you know, and I believe that God has given us all a unique framework and experience. And a lot of times we judge what that is, like we'll look at it. And like for me, you know, I come from a very conservative, homeschooled, um, very sheltered, very highly, highly sheltered environment. And it shaped my worldview so much. And, you know, as a 40-year-old wife and mother and professional, a communicator, I still see traces of that little girl coming out of me all the time, of someone who felt isolated, someone who felt afraid, someone who felt less than, someone who felt not educated or you know, didn't have something to bring to table. And instead of like looking at that and not dismissing it, it's actually a gift that I'm bringing to humanity because it's a point of view that I have of understanding belonging and understanding feeling othered and understanding, you know, the limitations around heavy doctrine and fundamentalism and stuff like that. And so that's my experience as Heather Parity. And so to answer your question, how did you get there? I I'm not where, you know, we're never there, you know, we're always just trying to figure out what is my unique point of view, how can I lean into that and use my voice unashamedly, where I don't place value on Ansel's gift versus mine, but just trust that God gave me whatever tools are in my hand for a reason. And how do I use those more faithfully?
SPEAKER_01You know, thank you. And that that's that that's awesome. You know, one of the probably one of the best pieces pieces of advice I got early on was from uh a guy I work with, a guy named RC Clark. Um uh he's uh actually out of Brazil, and and um I know if he follows you, by the way. By the um, but RC told me, he said, and maybe I was really trying to straddle the fence and on things and and really kind of being real um blah. You know, he said, look, he told me, he said, look, you need to be it's the craziest thing I've ever heard. You need to be more polarizing. I'm like, get out of here, what? You know, and um, and it really rocked that really that thought really rocked me because I just had to sit back and go, okay, you know, I that really gave me a green light to kind of just be me, you know? And and and to be and everything, you know, all parts of me, you know, that that um and I talk a lot, and I've I've talked a lot, you know, throughout the years about you know failing. I have failed miserably. But I have also been very blessed, you know, and and I've I I just I I don't you know don't hold back on any of that. And um and and and and and s especially in regards to the spiritual, you know, uh it mean it means a lot to me. And um so that that's some that's some powerful stuff. Exactly what you're saying is what different diff uh what's the word differentiate? Yeah, easy for me to say um you from somebody else, you know, and so just pushing information out, you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, and and and isn't it interesting, and not to get too conspiracy theory on you, but isn't it interesting that our entire culture and society and everything that's being pushed on us is to numb the senses, you know, and really being someone who can can sense and feel things deeply. And I'm not talking about a personality trait, you know, like my husband, I would argue, is not the most sensitive person in the world. He's military, he works, you know, in computers, he's very analytical, he's very OCD, but even some a personality like his can sense things and can feel things and can develop an intuition, develop that still small voice. And so it's not a personality thing, but I think it's a God-given gift that each of us have to really be aware of not only what we're experiencing, but what our target audience, the people we're trying to speak to, are experiencing. And everything from our food to technology to the news to everything is trying to dull us down to where we become less and less human. And I think the call for creators is not to have no tech issues or to have everything edited perfectly or have your branding on point, all this stuff that people are worried about, but to be tapped in, tuned in, and have something to say. You can have the crappiest audio and video and look a hot mess and all that stuff, but you can deliver powered fire that reaches people's souls, and you'll go so much farther than somebody who has everything branded and scripted, they are not tapped into that still small voice inside of them.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah. Uh I I I that's that's powerful. That's just that's that's so powerful. And I think you do that, and maybe that's why you know your what you the work you do has really touched me and touches so many. And uh so hey, what's the you know, I really uh for folks that don't know, you're really just on Instagram, correct?
SPEAKER_03Correct. I'm on Facebook a little bit, but I make everybody mad over there, so I try to stay on Instagram.
SPEAKER_01So well, uh but but hey, if you would like to follow Heather, right here, uh you here's her um her address that you can go and and follow her. And um, hey, one of the cool things that you do that I've that I get every week, uh I think it's every week, um, is your newsletter. And um how can folks sign up for your newsletter?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's over on my website, heatherparity.com, or you can go over to Substack and find Heather Parity. It's pretty easy to find. It's also linked up in my Instagram.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. I saw that a while ago when I when I looked at your Instagram, it's right in right under name. It's right in you can just click on it and sign up for your for your newsletter. And your newsletter is great. Matter of fact, yeah, I've got it right here on the one that that really spurred this conversation uh on um content flow. Um so um and as we're we're kind of landing the plane here, you know, what any other thoughts that that you'd want to share, you know, to help someone get started, um and um and and get them give them a little push to to go out and and and do something, create something.
SPEAKER_03You know what's interesting, I I'm in therapy. Uh I God willing will be in therapy to the day I die. I think it's a beautiful um beautiful gift that if you can and and you know have, it go for it. One of the things my therapist told me the other day, because we're working through, you know, a lot of stuff from my childhood and my past that I've never really dealt with before. Um, but also it's like it's like holding two things in in your hand. It's like you have your own personal healing journey and trying to become a better person and navigating your own insecurities and doubts and what your mom and your daddy said to you and all that. And then you have like the leader side, the communicator, the gifts and all of that. And sometimes it gets very confusing because you think, okay, well, in order for me to go here and to be what I know I'm called to be, I need to deal with all of this. And it's this weird balance of like how much am I ready to share parallel to my own healing and my own development. And one of the things that my therapist told me is that both can exist at the same time and not to be worried about navigating your own issues with still speaking out, because there's always something you can say and do that will help someone else. And maybe you're not ready to go to the depths and the level that you in your soul you know you want to get to because you're still navigating it. It doesn't mean you don't have something valuable to add. So a lot of times we discredit ourselves because we look around and we're like, you know what, I'm a single mom in an apartment and I'm struggling to make ends meet and I'm going through nursing school and I'm trying to figure it out. But I've always had a heart for abused kids because I was abused and so forth. But maybe one day when I have more money and better circumstances, I'll have more of a platform where I can help people. And I'm someone saying no, no, no, no, no, no, because sometimes we're perfectly positioned in our inadequacy and our discomfort to relate to other people who won't ever be able to relate to the people who were super successful in killing it. So it's like left figure out how to leverage what you see as weaknesses as a point of relatability and a point of connection for people because we don't always look at celebrities and people who had all the together, but we look at our peers and we look at people just a couple of steps ahead of us who just give a you know what and can care enough to reach back two steps behind us and just share our experience. So when Wherever you're at, you have value to bring.
SPEAKER_01Wow, that's that's uh that's powerful. Yeah, I and I think that being real and being transparent um with all those things that you talk about has you know has really you know you know has been has really blessed I guess how can I say this? I I I feel like that somebody said something to me the other day and they said, you know, if anything, you you're authentic and you're transparent. And I'm like I'm like, well, I I think maybe that was maybe the best compliment I I've I I've gotten. And so um, you know, I just think the more you can do that, the more people are attracted to who you who you are and and you know what you and listen to what you have to say.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yes.
SPEAKER_01So so listen, thank you so much for coming on here today. It's uh I can't tell you uh what a what a blessing that is, and you know, it's just I love your work and and uh and for folks out there uh you know you know check out Heather Parody and uh and and and what she's doing out there.
SPEAKER_02Thank you.
SPEAKER_01So um, so Heather, hey, great to see you and uh thank you. Come to Conway, you know, with cup of coffee, you know, blue cell coffee.
SPEAKER_03It'll happen at some point.
SPEAKER_01That sounds sounds like a plan. And uh um, hey, I will um thanks again for joining today, and we'll um hey, more later, as my friend HK Stewart would say, more later. All right.
SPEAKER_03That's it. Good seeing you again.
SPEAKER_01Good to see you. Thank you. Thanks, Heather.
unknownThank you.
SPEAKER_00Thanks again for joining us on the Common Grounds Podcast, where relationships fuel success. If you would like one of Ansel's books, please go to CommonGrounds3.com. If you'd like to have a coffee chat with Ansel, you can message him on LinkedIn. Our theme music was made by Jasper Red, and this episode was produced by Jamie Bosenko. Thank you again for joining us, and we'll see you next time.